Customer Reviews

Designing Web Graphics.3 (3rd Edition)

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

This book is intended for a certain audience, and for that audience this book largely succeeds. If you have little knowledge of web design and basic graphical concepts, there are few books on the market which equal Weinman for her general advice. More advanced web authorers may well be able to pick apart the code she gives here as faulty in some regards, but for a general overview of basic concepts, she's hard to beat. I found her discussion of color use and image resolution to be particularly helpful at the time I read it, even though now I might regard that information as terribly basic. Weinman has a unique gift, I think, for teaching, and I found her writing style engaging, even if there were, as has been stated elsewhere, a few contentual errors.

Of course, we're at a different point in web development than we were when this book was written almost a year ago. Now, many company websites give you much of this information as a part of their websites. Macromedia in particular has much of the advice of this book for free on its website--if you look for it.

Who, then, should buy this book? I think if you have a less-than-stellar web connection, or have problems spending hours reading text from websites, or simply do better learning from a real book, this is a great starting point.

Also, if you see teachers as fallible individuals whose value is principally in their ability to inspire less than in the absolute precision of their facts, this is your book as well.

And if you want a great collection of well-organized references from which to continue your learning, this, too, is where you want to start. Weinman has saved her readers--especially those with slow ISPs--the bother of scouring the net for valuable design resources. There are hundreds of top-notch graphic design web sites listed here by content, which can well save you HOURS of searching if you have a slow web connection, or if your searching skills aren't what they might be.

To be sure, there's valid criticism to make of this book. However, <designing web graphics.3> has so much potential applicability that a simple panning of it is entirely undeserved. If you know your way around any Macromedia(-like) product, you probably would think of this as a 1-star kind of book. But if, like its intended audience, you don't know a JPG from a hole in the wall, this is a 5-star effort.

this is more of a web design-in-general book, not just web graphics...nonetheless the information is helpful, especially for beginners. I also find myself referencing it quite often on the job, even though I read it cover-to-cover.

I agree with other reviewers on the HTML code in this book, it leaves much to be desired. However, I find the Hexadecimal Conversion Chart and Browser Safe Color Chart to be handy when I need them, and don't feel like resourcing the web.

All in all, it is a good desktop reference that I am sure I will use again and again.

Are you a web developer who lacks graphics design skills? Have you created your first several sites and wanted to go beyond the design elements in the FrontPage templates? Then this is the book for you since the author assumes that you have hacked a few web sites and have a strong interest, but little formal training, in design.

Or perhaps you are leading a project team and come from a programming backgound. You are comfortable with ASP, Java, Perl, and SQL, but graphics design is a bit of a mystery. This is your book too, since it is a serious book by a design professional and has sufficient depth to make you comfortable in any project meeting.

Lynda Weinman is not only a skilled designer but an experienced teacher. This beautifully illustrated 430-page book covers all of the graphics basics.

This book may be the only one you need.

Weinmann is a reknowned expert in her field, but you wouldn't know it from this book. The text is replete with sloppy mistakes -- from annoying typos and miscaptioned images to plain, old wrong information, including even basic HTML syntax. The book reads like a term paper that was written in an "all nighter" without a second look. Did Weinmann not have an editor for this title?

The problem with this book is that if you're a beginner, you're likely to be confused by the numerous errors. On the other hand, if you already know enough web design to spot the errors, then there's not much new to be learned from this volume --certainly not enough to justify its hefty price tag.

In short, this is a nice book to lay out on your coffee table, but not one to rely on for solid design strategies.

Anyone reading this review is likely aware of the avalanche of books about all aspects of the web. In the field of design for the web, Lynda Weinman shines fourth as the most no-BS author I've yet come across-and I look a lot! The contents are well organized, the subjects relevant. She takes you from the general & conceptual (including considerations of a career in web design) to production specifics. She includes workarounds to bypass the numerous design landmines which, unfortunately, HTML so generously provides. I'm a full-time design professional who is now self-teaching web design. If I could have only one book (in addition to an HTML reference), this book would be it. It's written by one smart lady. I've also bought her "Creative HTML Design", which I will soon begin to devour.

I am Johnathan Mark Smith and I been designing web sites forover 5 years now and I am always looking at other web designers workto learn new stuff. Lynda Weinman is one of the great designer out on the internet and her book designing web graphics.3 will help anyone get up to speed on designing graphics for the web. This book will show you how to prepare images and media for the web and it will also go into Style Sheets, Flash, Shockware and Browser-safe colors. Yes designing graphics for the web takes some time but with this book you can get up to speed in no time.

This book would deserve five stars if it weren't for MANY sloppy, but substantive, errors in both the text and in the graphics. Unlike typos, these errors affect the content. For example, several graphics are flipped, resulting in incorrect and confusing captions under graphics which are used as examples. If I weren't an experienced web designer, I might not have noticed. Beginners could have a difficult time replicating some of the techniques discussed. So, Lynda, you need to spend MORE time proofing a book that you're going to sell... I turn to Lynda's books again and again, so this carelessness is a big disappointment.

I would buy this but geepers, it's getting pretty old. The date refers to when it was released, not when it was written, so keep in mind it probably took 6 months to write. I wish they would withdraw some of these books once they got to a certain age and/or make it a bit clearer if and when they have been updated, because a lotta lotta stuff has happened in the last three years. That's an eternity in internet terms. I have to worry that a lot of the stuff in this book is no longer up to date (like web safe colors, fast becoming last year's problem)

Does this book even mention microsoft.net? Today they released flash mx, and so on and so on. If you write a book for the net, why not update it each year? I'm fed up with being stuck with books that have old information in them, going to the trouble of memorising and becoming aquainted with stuff, and then finding there are better+newer+different ways of doing it. It's not like these books are cheap either.

I want my books up to date, and I'm willing to pay more for something that is going to at least last me a little while. April 1999, that's just too long ago.

This book was the first and only book I have bought from Lynda Weinman and it will be the last. I have rarely seen a design/technical book that was so full of errors, innacuracies and downright misguided advice, especially coming from someone who has such a "good" reputation in the industry as Mrs. Weinman. Whoever technically edited this book should be fired immediately. Had I taken the time to go to a library to read a few passages of the book first, I never would have bought it in the first place.

The first paragraph of the chapter on style sheets alone shows just how little Mrs Weinman understands the Web as a medium. This book is now two years old but is of lesser value to Web designers today than older ones like David Siegel's Creating Killer Web Sites and really pales when compared to inspiring works like Jeff Veen's "The Art And Science Of Web Design" or Zeldman's "Taking Your Talent To The Web" both of which are firmly grounded in Web reality and are forward thinking enough to retain their value for years to come.

On the design side itself, Robin William's, Mark Oldach's and even the above mentionned Siegel's books are of far better quality even if its visual style looks dated compared to today's Web.

In conclusion I would never recommend this book to anyone and would advise people to look elsewhere for practical advice or inspiration on Web imagery.

If you are a graphic designer looking to start web work, this book is a must read. If you are already a web designer, it is a great reference book. This book taught me more than any teacher ever did.